Lazarus, of the Pharifee and Publican, of the unforgiv ing fervant, of the good Samaritan. There is nothing in all heathen antiquity to be compared to thefe; nothing that speaks fo forcibly to our tendereft feelings and affec tions, and leave fuch deep and lafting impreffions upon the foul.

3dly. The Greek and Roman fables are most of them founded on improbable or impoffible circumstances, and are fuppofed conversations between animate or inanimate beings, not endowed with the power of fpeech; between birds, beasts, reptiles, and trees; a circumstance which fhocks the imagination, and of course weakens the force of the inftruction.

Our Saviour's parables on the contrary are all of them images and allufions taken from nature, and from occur rences which are most familiar to our observation and experience in common life; and the events related are not only fuch as might very probably happen, but feveral of them are supposed to be fuch as actually did; and this would have the effect of a true historical narrative, which we all know to carry much greater weight and authority with it than the most ingenious fiction. Of the former fort are the rich man and Lazarus, of the good Samaritan, and of the prodigal fon. There are others in which our Saviour feems to allude to fome hiftorical facts which happened in thofe times; as that wherein it is faid, that a king went into a far country, there to receive a kingdom.

This probably refers to the history of Archelaus, who, after the death of his father, Herod the Great, went to Rome to receive from Auguftus the conformation of his father's will, by which he had the kingdom of Judea left to him.

These circumstances give a decided fuperiority to our Lord's parables over the fables of the ancients; and if we compare them with those of the Koran, the difference is still greater. The parables of Mahomet are trifling; uninterefting, tedious, and dull. Among other things which he has borrowed from Scripture, one is the para

ble of Nathan, in which he has moft ingenuously contriv ed to destroy all its fpirit, force, and beauty; and has fo completely distorted and deformed its whole texture and compofition, that if the commentator had not informed you, in very gentle terms, that it is the parable of Nathan a little difguifed, you would fcarce have known it to be the fame. Such is the difference between a prophet who is really inspired, and an impoftor who pretends to be fo.

Nor is it only in his parables, but in his other difcourfes to the people, that Jefus draws his doctrines and instructions from the scenes of nature, from the objects that furrounded him, from the most common occurrences of life, from the seasons of the year, from fome extraordinary incidents or remarkable tranfactions. "Thus," as a learned and ingenious writer has obferved, upon curing a blind man, "he ftyles himself the light of the world, and reproves the Pharifees for their spiritual blindness and inexcufable obftinacy in refufing to be cured and enlightened by him. On little children being brought to him, he recommends the innocence, the fimplicity, the meeknefs, the humility, the docility, of that lovely age, as indifpenfable qualifi tions for those that would enter into the kingdom of heaven. Beholding the flowers of the field, and the fowls of the air, he teaches his difciples to frame right and worthy notions of that Providence which fupports and adorns them, and will therefore affuredly not neglect the fuperior order of rational beings. Obferving the fruits of the earth, he instructs them to judge of men by their fruitfulness under all the mean of grace. From the mention of meat and drink, he leads them to the facred rite of eating his body and drinking his blood in a spiritual sense. From external ablutions, he deduces the neceffity of purifying the heart, and cleansing the affections. Thofe that were fifhers, he teaches to be fishers of men; to draw them by the force of argument and perfuafion, aided by the influence of divine grace, to the belief and practice of true religion. Seeing the money-changers, he exhorts his difciples to lay out their feveral talents to the beft advantage. Being among the fheep-folds, he proves himself

* See Bishop Law's Confiderasions on the Theory of Religion.

the true fhepherd of Souls. Among vines he difcourfes of the fpiritual husbandman and vine-dreffer, and draws a parallel between his vineyard and the natural one. Upon the appearance of fummer in the trees before him, he points out evident figns of his approaching kingdom.— When the harvest comes on, he reminds his difciples of the fpiritual harvest, the harveft of true believers; and exhorts them to labor diligently in that work, and add their prayers to Heaven for its fuccefs. From fervants being made free in the fabbatical year, he takes occafion to proclaim a nobler emancipation and more important redemption from the flavery of fin, and the bondage of cor ruption, by the death of Christ. From the eminence of a city standing on a hill, he turns his difcourfe to the confpicuous fituation of his own difciples. From the temple before him, he points to that of his own body; and from Herod's unadvisedly leading out his army to meet the king of Arabia, who came against him with a fuperior force, and defeated him, a leffon is held out to all who entered on the Christian warfare, that they should firft well weigh and carefully compute the difficulties attending it, and by the grace of God refolve to furmount them."

In the fame manner, when he delivered the parable of the fower, which we find in this chapter, and which will be the next fubject of our confideration, it was probably feed-time, and from the fhip in which he taught he might obferve the husbandmen fcattering their feed upon the earth. From thence he took occafion to illuftrate, by that rural and familiar image, the different effects which the doctrines of Chriftianity had on different men, according to the different tempers and difpofitions that they happened to meet with.

"Behold," fays he, "a fower went forth to fow.. And when he fowed, fome fell by the way-fide, and the fowls came and devoured them up. Some fell upon ftony places, where they had not much earth, and fortwith they fprung up, because they had no deepnefs of earth; and when the fun was up they were fcorched, and because they had no root they withered away. And fome fell among thorns, and the thorns fprang up and choked them. But other

fell into good ground, and brought forth fruit, fome a hundred fold, fome fixty fold, fome thirty fold." As our bleffed Lord, foon after he had uttered this parable, explained it to his difciples, it is highly proper that you fhould have this explanation in his own words. "Hear

ye, therefore," fays he, "the parable of the fower.When any one heareth the word of the kingdom and underftandeth it not, then cometh the wicked one, and catcheth away that which was fown in his heart. This is he which received feed by the way-fide. But he

received the feed into ftony places, the fame is he that heareth the word, and anon with joy receiveth it; yet hath he not root in himself, but dureth for a while; for when tribulation or perfecution arifeth because of the word, by and by he is offended. He alfo that received feed among the thorns, is he that heareth the word, and and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becometh unfruitful. But he that received feed into the good ground, is he that heareth the word and understandeth it; which also beareth fruit, and bringeth forth fome a hundred fold, fome fixty, some thirty."

Such is the parable of the fower, and the explanation of it by our Saviour, which will furnish us with abundant matter for a great variety of very important reflections. But as these cannot be distinctly stated and fufficiently enlarged upon at prefent, without going to a confiderable length of time, and trefpaffing too far on that patience and indulgence which I have already but too often put to the test, I must reserve for my next Lecture the observations I have to offer on this very interesting and instructive parable.